Start date set for Wikileaks whistleblower’s court martial

Bradley Manning, the US military intelligence analyst charged with leaking thousands of classified US government cables to the anti-secrecy group Wiki-leaks, will face a court martial in September, a military judge has ruled.

Manning, 24, faces 22 charges, the most serious of which could see him in prison for life, for downloading more than 700,000 classified files from the military while serving in Iraq, in what has been the biggest leak of secret documents in US history.

In a blow for Manning, judge Colonel Denise Lind yesterday ruled against a motion filed by his lawyer to dismiss the charges because of what he called the prosecutor’s intentional withholding of evidence, and set a trial date of 21 September.

The trial will take place more than two years after his arrest.

In a pre-trial hearing, Col Lind said: “The court finds no evidence of prosecutorial misconduct.” Military prosecutors argue that they are meeting their obligations to hand over evidence to Manning’s lawyers and that there is still time to provide them with the material before the trial begins.

Manning, in a dress uniform and black-rimmed glasses, listened intently as the judge read out her rulings.

A handful of Manning’s supporters, who view him as a whistleblower, sat behind him.

Col Lind instructed them to hold back from making noises during court proceedings after one laughed loudly at the judge’s ruling.

Manning is accused of downloading files from the military’s Secret Internet Protocol Router Network, or SIPRNet, while serving in the army’s 10th Mountain Division in Iraq.